Methods, systems, and data structures for generating a rasterizer

ABSTRACT

Methods, systems and data structures produce a rasterizer. A graphical state is detected on a machine architecture. The graphical state is used for assembling a shell rasterizer. The machine architecture is used for selecting replacement logic that replaces portions of shell logic in the shell rasterizer. The machine architecture is used for selectively inserting memory management logic into portions of the shell logic to produce.

This application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No.12/697,067, filed on Jan. 29, 2010, which is a continuation of U.S.patent application Ser. No. 12/255,299, filed on Oct. 21, 2008, nowissued as U.S. Pat. No. 7,710,430, which is a continuation of U.S.patent application Ser. No. 11/229,276, filed on Sep. 16, 2005, nowissued as U.S. Pat. No. 7,453,466, which is a continuation of U.S.patent application Ser. No. 10/608,453, filed on Jun. 26, 2003, nowissued as U.S. Pat. No. 6,989,838, which are all incorporated herein byreference in their entireties.

TECHNICAL FIELD

Embodiments of the present invention relate generally to rasterizerapplications, and more particularly to dynamically generating arasterizer application for a desired graphical state.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

Three-dimensional images (3D) can be rendered on an electronic displayusing two steps. The first step is for transforming a desired graphicalstate to pixel coordinates. The second step is for drawing linesconnecting the coordinates and for filling a geometric structurerepresented by the connected coordinates with pixel data (attributes). Agraphical state is a desired image that is to be rendered on theelectronic display.

During the transformation step, two-dimensional (2D) space projectedpolygons are produced. Moreover, light source parameters are applied forproducing vertex colors. These colors are typically stored in Red,Green, and Blue (RGB) formats.

The second step uses a rasterizer (application) for drawing and fillingpolygons within regions of the electronic display. The rasterizer takes2D polygon and 2D vertex attributes as parameters. The attributes caninclude 2D position, depth dimension (Z), RGB vertex color (from acomputation or manual input), 2D texture coordinates, and optionally avertex alpha value. This alpha value is generally an 8 bit quantitystored with color values RGB for aligning to 32 bits.

Conventionally, rasterizers are embodied as large programming librariesor drivers residing on computing devices having sufficiently largestorage and memory. This is so, because the number of possible graphicalstates that may need to be rendered by a rasterizer is very large.Therefore, in order to adequately account for all the possible graphicalstates of any processing rasterizer a large amount of logic needs to beavailable to the device that is rendering the graphical state within anelectronic display.

However, this is a considerable waste of storage and memory on thedevice. As a result, a large variety of electronic devices which do nothave sufficient storage or memory cannot benefit from robust rasterizerapplications. Some of these devices include personal digital assistants(PDAs), cell phones, intelligent appliances, and others. Thus,conventionally these devices have extremely limited graphicscapabilities.

Therefore, there is a need for improved implementations and techniquesfor providing improved rasterizers. These implementations and techniquesshould be tailored to the devices processing them in order to better usestorage and memory, such that devices traditionally not capable ofrendering advanced graphics can now enjoy robust imaging capabilities.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a flow diagram of a method for providing a rasterizer, inaccordance with one embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram depicting another method for providing a rasterizer,in accordance with one embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 3 is a diagram of a rasterizer building system, in accordance withone embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 4 is a diagram of a rasterizer data structure, in accordance withone embodiment of the invention.

DESCRIPTION OF EMBODIMENTS

Novel methods, systems, and data structures for producing a rasterizerare taught. In the following detailed description of the embodiments,reference is made to the accompanying drawings, which form a parthereof, and in which is shown by way of illustration, but notlimitation, specific embodiments of the invention that may be practiced.These embodiments are described in sufficient detail to enable one ofordinary skill in the art to understand and implement them, and it is tobe understood that other embodiments may be utilized and thatstructural, logical, and electrical changes may be made withoutdeparting from the spirit and scope of the present disclosure. Thefollowing detailed description is, therefore, not to be taken in alimiting sense, and the scope of the embodiments of the inventionsdisclosed herein is defined only by the appended claims.

FIG. 1 illustrates a flow diagram of one method 100 for providing arasterizer, in accordance with one embodiment of the invention. By“rasterizer” it is meant a rasterizer application having software logiccapable of being processed on a machine. Thus, the method 100 can beimplemented in any microprocessor architecture. Moreover, the method 100can be implemented in hardware, software, firmware, or in combinationsof hardware, software, and firmware within or accessible tomicroprocessor architectures.

As will be demonstrated to one of ordinary skill in the art, in thedescription that follows, the method 100 dynamically produces arasterizer in a novel manner, which results, when executed, in moreefficient use of storage or memory on a processing machine. In contrast,existing and conventional rasterizers are statically determined, suchthat any given graphical state is predefined and preinstalled within aprocessing machine.

Thus, microprocessor architectures implementing embodiments of method100 experience a decrease in space utilization. This is achieved withoutadversely impacting rasterizer performance or quality. This is asignificant advantage over conventional techniques, since asmicroprocessor architectures become increasingly smaller in theindustry; the ability to achieve quality image processing has become agrowing concern.

Initially, a graphics application or system (e.g., DirectX ApplicationProgramming Interface (API), OpenGL API, and others) processing on amachine architecture makes a request for a graphical image to be drawnon an electronic display of a machine. The request is combined toproduce an appropriate graphical state. The graphical state is a statethat shows the relationship between attributes of the desired image withrespect to any attributes for additional images, which may or may not bealready present within the display. Thus, the graphical state isattribute information for the images as they will appear within thedisplay once the desired graphical image is inserted into an existingstate of the display.

For example, if a user is interacting with a 3D graphics applicationwhere the display already includes an image of a 3D cube and the userfurther desires a 3D oval to be overlaid onto the cube within thedisplay, then the graphical state can be defined as a 3D ovalsuperimposed on a 3D cube. In order to produce the desired image (3Doval superimposed on a 3D cube), the graphical state is mapped to arasterizer that when executed is capable of producing the desired image.

Conventionally, all combinations of possible or permissible graphicalstates are predefined within a rasterizer driver and when a particulargraphical state is required, the appropriate predefined rasterizer isacquired from storage or memory. This consumes excessive storage andmemory resources of the processing machine, since all possiblerasterizers need to exist before any particular graphical state isactually requested from a user. However, with teachings of theembodiments for this invention, a rasterizer is dynamically generatedwhen needed from smaller building blocks of logic, which are assembledfor producing rasterizers associated with multiple graphical statecombinations. Therefore, a significant amount of storage or memory canbe saved, and machines not previously capable of rendering qualityimages (e.g., PDAs, cell phones, intelligent appliance, and others) canbenefit from quality image processing, which has been previouslyreserved only for machines with large storage and memory resources. Thisis achieved by permitting rasterizers to process on these machines,which have heretofore been incapable of processing a variety ofrasterizers because of limited resources.

At 110, a graphical state is received from a graphics application. Thegraphics application sets a variety of image attribute variables neededto define the graphical state, such as depth buffer enablement (3Deffects), depth buffer testing (less than, greater than, fixed), depthbuffer write enablement, texture address mode (wrap, clamp, mirror),texture combine mode (no texture, modulate, add, replace, and others),texture type (16 pits per pixel, 24 bits per pixel, compressed, alpha(mapping from 8 to 32 bits), texture filtering (bilinear filter, pointsampling, and others), alpha blending (blending source and destinationcolors), fog enablement (linear per pixel), and other desired imageattributes. The image attributes and other attributes associated with anexisting display state (e.g., having a pre-existing image or being in aninitial state with no pre-existing images) are used for defining theappropriate graphical state.

Once the graphical state is received, a check is made at 120 todetermine if a rasterizer is already available in memory or storage forgenerating the graphical state. In one embodiment, the graphical stateis hashed or indexed at 122 into a data structure (e.g., table, list, ortree) to determine whether a pointer reference to the appropriaterasterizer already exists, and if so, at 124, the pointer is returned tothe graphics application.

If a pre-existing rasterizer, which can produce the graphical state, isnot available in storage or memory, then, at 130, the graphical state isrepresented as a series of processing tokens used for generating a shellrasterizer. This is achieved by scanning the graphical state'sattributes or properties and inserting generic processing tokens atappropriate locations, these processing tokens identify the type ofrasterizer processing needed to achieve portions of the graphical state(e.g., depth testing, modulation, texture processing, and others). Forexample, to identify the processing needed to satisfy a depth testingattribute, the following tokens can be generated:

-   -   Setup_DepthBuffer_(—)16: moves a 16-bit depth pointer to the        correct memory location for scanning;    -   DepthTest_(—)16: loads the 16-bit depth value from a depth        buffer;    -   ZTest_Less: compare current depth value to buffer value, using a        logic operator (<);

DepthWrite_(—)16: write the current depth value to the 16-bit buffer itthe test passes; and

-   -   DepthIncrement_(—)16: increment the depth buffer memory pointer        by an amount appropriate for a 16-bit depth buffer.

Of course a variety of other tokens, which are generically needed tosatisfy a graphical state can also be used, and the above example for adepth test is presented for purposes of illustration only. One ofordinary skill in the imaging arts readily recognizes the variousprocessing which occurs for achieving a particular image attribute orportion of the graphical state. Accordingly, all such processingexpansion is included with the embodiments of this invention.

The graphical state becomes an ordered tokenized stream of processinglogic having unique data values that are dictated by the needed imageattributes of the graphical state. Once the processing tokens are known,generic rasterizer functions can be acquired from storage or memory thatoptimally perform the needed operations (based on properties orlimitations of a machine architecture processing the method 100). Only asmall subset of functions is needed to adequately process multiplecombinations of graphical states. For example, a function can be usedfor flat (F) and smooth S (shading), texture (T); F, S, and T with Z(depth) testing; F and S with modulated T; FT (Flat Texture) and ST(smooth texture) with Z; and the like.

At 140, a rasterizer shell is assembled as a data structure thatrepresents generic rasterizer functions having unique parameters (imageattributes) needed for producing the graphical state. The genericrasterizer functions are represented as pointer references within therasterizer shell where information about the pointers is availablewithin the data structure. The information about the pointer can includebyte lengths of the rasterizer functions, pointers to memory having theoperational codes for the rasterizer functions, offset positions forinserting setup or initialization logic, offsets positions to insertinternal looping logic, offset positions to insert logic into thelopping logic that executes conditionally if color is writtensuccessfully, offset positions to insert logic that consistentlyexecutes at the end of the looping logic, and others. Thus, the uniqueimaging attributes of the desired graphical state and templaterasterizer functions are interfaced to one another using the rasterizershell. The imaging attributes can be viewed as Meta data informationassociated with the template or generic rasterizer functions and is usedto dynamically generate a specific rasterizer, which can be executed toproduce the desired graphical state.

At 150, an architecture for a machine that will process a rasterizergenerated by populating or instantiating the shell rasterizer isdetermined. Image processing can require different types ofinterpolation and translation depending upon whether an image is beingrendered on a 32-bit machine versus a 16-bit machine, depending uponavailable Random Access Memory, depending upon the speed of underlyingprocessors, depending upon the number of registers available to theprocessors, and the like. Thus, by determining the properties associatedwith a processing machine's architecture, customized logic forperforming rasterizer operations and memory management can be developedand made available for dynamic insertion into the shell rasterizer.

Accordingly, at 160, depending upon the architecture, replacement logicis selected from a library of available functions that are accessible tothe machine. This replacement logic is used with the shell rasterizer topopulate the generic rasterizer functions with the needed imageattributes, which when executed will optimally generate the desiredgraphical state (based on properties or limitations of a machinearchitecture processing the method 100). For example, if only 2registers are available for processing a rasterizer on the machine and ageneric rasterizer function needs 3 registers, replacement logic for thegeneric function or portions of the generic function can be acquiredfrom a logic library accessible to the machine.

The replacement logic can also be represented as data structuresincluding total number of operational codes, input registers needed,input registers used as scratch, the identity of the operational codesused, and others.

Some example replacement logic can include texture address computationsfor wrap, clamp, or mirror modes; depth-value fetching; depth-valuecomparisons; fog calculations; texture adding (instead of multiplying)for flat (F) rasterizer functions, texture adding (instead ofmultiplying) for smooth (S) rasterizer functions, and others. Of course,a variety of additional replacement logic can be implemented to performrasterizer functions based on architectures for machines that willprocess a rasterizer consisting of one or more rasterizer functions. Allsuch variations are intended to be included with embodiments of thisinvention.

In a similar manner, at 162, logic can also be inserted into the shellrasterizer, rather than replacing logic. Insertion logic (which addslogic rather than replacing logic) can also be represented as structuressimilar to replacement logic. Insertion logic is inserted into the shellrasterizer to manage memory more efficiently. Moreover, insertion logiccan be inserted based on a simulated execution of the shell rasterizer.That is, if a prior rasterizer function included in the shell rasterizerpushes a needed variable to the execution stack, then the insertionlogic can be intertwined within the shell rasterizer at the properlocation to pop the needed variable from the stack at the processinglocation within the shell rasterizer where the variable is required.

In this way, memory usage within the shell rasterizer can be optimizedto the architecture of the machine, which will process the shellrasterizer (by using memory interfaces and architectural limitations(properties) of the machine architecture). Further, each machinearchitecture includes its own API that can be used to interface to theexecution stack. Thus, selective memory management logic is selectivelyinserted into the shell rasterizer based on the simulated execution ofthe shell rasterizer and the machine architecture that is used toactually execute the shell rasterizer.

Moreover, the shell rasterizer provides an automated facility orinterface technique for passing image attribute values to genericrasterizer functions and modified generic rasterizer functions. Thisparameter passing technique includes pointers to generic rasterizerfunctions needed for processing a graphical state and image attributevalues consumed by those functions that are passed via registers withinthe processing machine. Generic functions can also be altered based on aprocessing machine's architecture so that values expected in known(input) registers within the machine architecture may not be availablewhen needed during shell rasterizer processing, so that scratchregisters (scratch) may not be appropriately consumed or reused by thereplacement or insertion logic.

However, in embodiments of this invention, register usage is trackedwhile the shell rasterizer is being altered with replacement andinsertion logic. Correspondingly, memory management logic (stackfunctions) is (are) automatically and dynamically inserted into theshell rasterizer to ensure that input registers are available whenneeded and that scratch registers are optimally used based on theprocessing machine's architecture. In this way, some embodiments of thisinvention do not need to employ a full register allocation algorithm,although other embodiments can implement a full register algorithm.

At 170, after the shell rasterizer has been altered to includereplacement logic and memory management logic, the shell rasterizer isproduced as a dynamically generated rasterizer. The rasterizer iscapable of being executed on a processing machine to efficiently producea desired graphical state.

In some embodiments, at 180, a pointer reference to the rasterizer isgenerated. Furthermore, at 122, the desired graphical state can beindexed or hashed into a storage or memory data structure along with thepointer reference. Thus, when a graphics application makes a subsequentrequest for a previously processed graphical state, the graphical stateis hashed or searched in the memory data structure to acquire thepointer reference. When the pointer reference is accessed, thepreviously dynamically generated rasterizer is processed to generate thegraphical state. Therefore, various embodiments of this invention can befurther optimized with memory caching techniques to improve rasterizerimage rendering.

Embodiments for this invention permit rasterizer logic to be organizedand processed within a machine more efficiently in order to renderimages on an electronic display. The small subsets are dynamically andselectively modified, organized, and augmented to produce individualinstances of rasterizers, that when executed generate desired graphicalstates. As a result, less storage and memory are needed on a machine togenerate quality image processing. Consequently, machine architecturesthat were previously incapable of rendering quality images can nowproduce quality images using only minimal memory resources.

FIG. 2 is a diagram depicting another method 200 for providing arasterizer, in accordance with one embodiment of the invention. Therasterizer resides in a computer-accessible medium as a data structurethat when accessed will execute in order to produce a desired graphicalstate on an electronic display of a processing machine. Thus, the method200 can be implemented, installed, or enabled to processing on anymicroprocessor device.

Initially, a graphical state is requested from a graphics applicationinterfaced to the method 200. The graphical state includes a variety ofunique image attributes associated with a requested image that is to bedrawn on the electronic display. The electronic display may also includezero or more already existing images. Each of any of these pre-existingimages will also include a variety of image attributes or properties.Thus, the desired state of the display after effecting the changesdefined in the desired image attributes against a pre-existing displaystate represents the graphical state.

The graphical state is received by the processing of the method 200. Thegraphical state is indexed or hashed within storage or memory for theprocessing machine to determine whether the graphical state has beenpreviously processed and still has a dynamically generated rasterizeravailable within memory or storage of the processing machine. If apreviously generated rasterizer does exist, then a reference to thepre-existing rasterizer is returned for immediate processing.

If a pre-existing rasterizer does not exist, then the graphical state isrestated, re-expressed, expanded, or altered to be represented as atokenized data stream. The tokens of the data stream representrasterizer functions or logic that is needed to produce selectiveportions of the desired graphical state. For example, tokens canrepresent the processing steps that need to occur on the desired imageattributes in order to produce a depth test.

Once the tokenized data stream of the desired graphical state isproduced, a shell rasterizer is acquired from a logic or functionlibrary that includes the processing steps represented in the tokenizeddata stream. At this time, memory is also allocated within theprocessing machine for the shell rasterizer, which will become amodified rasterizer. The shell rasterizer includes one or more pointersto generic rasterizer functions which are needed to produce the desiredgraphical state. The shell rasterizer also includes the specific imageattribute values needed by those generic functions to produce thedesired image.

Next, a processing machine's architectural properties are acquired.Architectural properties can include number of available registers forprocessing rasterizers, available RAM, processing speed, and the like.Based on these attributes, the generic rasterizer functions may requiremodification to optimally and successfully produce a modified rasterizerfrom the shell rasterizer. For example, input and scratch registers mayrequire alteration within portions of the logic of the genericrasterizer functions.

At 210, selective replacement logic for the generic rasterizer functionsare determined by using the properties of the processing machine'sarchitecture, depicted at 225. At 220 any needed memory management logicthat is required by any inserted replacement logic is inserted to ensureproper and efficient memory management. The memory management logic usesthe memory interface (memory management API) of the processing machine,depicted at 225. The memory management logic will update branches,execution stack, and needed memory for the shell rasterizer.

Each processing token defined in the tokenized data stream iteratesthrough the processing at 210-225, until all processing tokens in thedata stream have been addressed.

In one embodiment, the memory management logic keeps track of registerusage depending upon simulated execution for the shell rasterizer.During this book keeping exercise, the memory management logic cangenerate logic that will push and pop data from an execution stack ofthe processing machine when the shell rasterizer executes as a modifiedrasterizer on the processing machine.

At 230, the shell rasterizer is completely modified as a new modifiedrasterizer that when executed produces the desired graphical state.Accordingly at 240, and in some embodiments, a pointer reference to themodified rasterizer is returned to the graphics application thatrequested the desired image. In one embodiment, the modified rasterizeris temporarily indexed or hashed within storage or memory of theprocessing machine, such that if a subsequent request is received for animage defined by the same graphical state, the appropriate rasterizercan be immediately returned for use. Indexing or hashing can occur byusing the desired graphical state, which is associated as a unique entryin a memory data structure based on the indexing or hashing techniqueimplemented. The data structure entry includes a record having a pointerreference to the modified rasterizer.

The replacement and memory management logic are small subsets ofselective logic for rasterizer functions and for memory management,respectively. This logic can itself be represented as an API or libraryof routines within the storage or memory of the processing machine. Theavailable shell rasterizers are generic rasterizer templates that aredynamically modifiable. Conversely, the replacement and memory logic arespecific instructions designed to efficiently and properly usearchitectural resources of a designated processing machine. Theprocessing of method 200 provides embodiments for dynamically modifyingthe shell rasterizers with selective replacement and memory logic usingthe image attribute values originally provided by a graphicsapplication. The result is a dynamic modified rasterizer designed togenerate a desired graphical state when executed by the processingmachine. The modified rasterizer executes in a memory efficient mannerwithin the processing machine.

Once the method 200 produces a modified rasterizer, any memory orstorage required to produce the modified rasterizer is flushed on theprocessing machine (not shown in FIG. 2). In this way, all availablememory or storage is available when the processing machine referencesand thereby executes the modified rasterizer.

It is now apparent how embodiments of the method 200 provide improvedimage memory management for processing machines. By improving andreducing memory resource requirements, rasterizer processing can occuron electronic processing machines, which have previously be incapable ofperforming such operations. As a result, smaller machines (e.g., PDAs,cell phones, intelligent appliances, and others) with minimal memoryresources can enjoy the image processing experienced by larger machines.

FIG. 3 is a diagram of a rasterizer building system 300, in accordancewith one embodiment of the invention. The rasterizer building system 300is implemented on a microprocessor architecture for a processingmachine. The components of the system are interfaced together with oneanother via software communications and hardware resources available onthe processing machine.

The rasterizer building system 300 includes a token building application310 and a composing application 320. Optionally, the rasterizer buildingsystem 300 includes a graphics application 330, an indexing application340, and/or a rasterizer index data store 350. Further, the variouscomponents of the rasterizer building system 300 can be all local withinthe processing machine or have some components that are accessible overa network.

The token building application 310 takes as a desired graphical stateassociated with desired image attributes of an image not yet depicted onan electronic display (interfaced to the rasterizer building system 300)and image attributes for images, which may or may not be pre-existing onthe electronic display. The token building application 310 scans theentire graphical state to restate, expand, or re-express the graphicalstate as a series of ordered processing tokens. The processing tokensdefine the rasterizer actions or functions that need to be performed togenerate the desired graphical state.

The composing application 320 selects and acquires a shell rasterizerthat can perform the processing steps defined within the tokenized datastream. Moreover, the composing application 320 scans each token of thetokenized data stream and determines whether replacement logic or memorymanagement insertion logic is needed for a shell rasterizer. Replacementlogic is subsets of logic or operations that need to be used in theshell rasterizer (for a number of any selected generic rasterizerfunctions) based on the architecture of the processing machine (e.g.,register, processor, and memory limitations).

After a token is altered with replacement logic, memory management logicis inserted at appropriate locations within the shell rasterizer. Thememory management logic ensures memory is in the proper and mostefficient state before the next processing step of the shell rasterizerexecutes, assuming the shell rasterizer were to be actually executing.In this way, memory management logic is inserted based on the actionstaken by the composing application 320 with a processing token. Thecomposing application 320 simulates execution of any replacement logicinserted into the shell rasterizer. Moreover, the memory managementlogic is based on an API associated with the processing machine formanaging memory and memory resources.

Once the composing application 320 completes processing each token inthe tokenized data stream that represents the desired graphical state,the shell rasterizer represents a specific instance of a modifiedrasterizer that when executed produces the desired graphical state onthe electronic display. In one embodiment, a pointer reference to themodified rasterizer is generated and returned to a graphics application330 which initially requested the desired graphical state. The graphicsapplication 330 can reference or access the pointer in order to executethe modified rasterizer.

In still other embodiments, a pointer to the modified rasterizer issupplied to an indexing or hashing application 340. The indexingapplication 340 uses the desired graphical state to index the pointer toa specific location within a rasterizer index store 350. The rasterizerindex store 350 can be in RAM memory or external storage. In 350 can bepermanent or temporary storage. In other words, the rasterizer indexdata store 350 can be supplied on an external computer-accessible mediumand interfaced to a processing machine. Thus, a processing machine candefine a variety of graphical states and store them on removablestorage, where the storage can be re-inserted or interfaced to themachine and acquired by the indexing application 340 when needed.

Embodiments of the rasterizer building system 300 can be implemented inorder to dynamically build rasterizers for a processing machine. Thedynamically built rasterizer processes in a memory efficient mannerbased on the architectural limitations and properties of the processingmachine. Moreover, the rasterizer building system 300 can be used toindex and acquire rasterizers that were previously dynamically built bythe rasterizer building system 300.

FIG. 4 is a diagram of one rasterizer data structure 400, in accordancewith one embodiment of the invention. The rasterizer data structure 400resides in a computer-accessible medium 401. The data structure 400 neednot reside on a single computer-accessible medium 401 and need not beprefabricated within a computer-accessible medium 401 before it isconsumed. In other words, the data structure 400 can be logically andprogrammatically assembled for a variety of disparatecomputer-accessible media 401.

The rasterizer data structure 400 includes shell logic 402, replacementlogic 403, and insertion logic 404. Further, the rasterizer datastructure 400, when processed on a processing machine produces a desiredgraphical state. The rasterizer data structure 400 is produced by abuilding application 410 on the processing machine. Also, the rasterizerdata structure is initially built by the building application 410because a needed graphical state received from a graphics application420 is not available within memory or storage of the processing machinewhen requested by the graphics application 420.

The shell logic 402 includes rasterizer functions identified in thedesired graphical state. Selective portions of the rasterizer functionsare altered by the replacement logic 403 based on the processingmachine's architectural limitations and resources. Moreover, ifreplacement logic 403 is inserted into the rasterizer data structure400, then corresponding insertion logic 404 associated with memorymanagement logic are inserted within the rasterizer data structure 400.

The insertion or memory management logic 404 maintains a properprocessing state for the rasterizer data structure 400 when it isactually processed on the processing machine. In 404 can include logicfor updating memory branches, for pushing data to the processingmachine's execution stack, and for popping data from the executionstack.

In one embodiment, the rasterizer data structure 400 is dynamicallygenerated by the building application 410 when the building application410 receives a graphical state request from the graphics application420. In another embodiment, the rasterizer data structure 400 isprefabricated by the building application 410 and made accessible to theprocessing machine via memory or storage (local or removable). Thespecific instance of the rasterizer data structure 400 is determined bythe requested graphical state and the architecture of the processingmachine.

Further in some embodiments, the rasterizer data structure 400 can beconsumed through accessing a pointer to the rasterizer data structure400. The pointer can be indexed or hashed into another data structurebased on a location associated with the desired graphical state.

Embodiments of this invention permit microprocessor architectures withlimited memory and processing resources to benefit from quality imageprocessing associated with rasterizers. These rasterizers aredynamically assembled from subsets of logic that are assembled based onthe memory limitations and resources of the microprocessor machines.Conventionally, rasterizer processing has had only limited availabilityon a variety of microprocessor architectures having limited resources.However, now these architectures (e.g., PDAs, cell phones, intelligentappliances, and others) can benefit with the embodiments and teachingsof this invention.

The above description is intended to be illustrative, and notrestrictive. Many other embodiments will be apparent to those of skillin the art upon reviewing the above description. The scope ofembodiments of the invention should, therefore, be determined withreference to the appended claims, along with the full scope ofequivalents to which such claims are entitled.

The Abstract is provided to comply with 37 C.F.R. §1.72(b) requiring anAbstract that will allow the reader to quickly ascertain the nature andgist of the technical disclosure. It is submitted with the understandingthat it will not be used to interpret or limit the scope or meaning ofthe claims.

In the foregoing Description of the Embodiments, various features aregrouped together in a single embodiment for the purpose of streamliningthe disclosure. This method of disclosure is not to be interpreted asreflecting an intention that the claimed embodiments of the inventionrequire more features than are expressly recited in each claim. Rather,as the following claims reflect, inventive subject matter lies in lessthan all features of a single disclosed embodiment. Thus the followingclaims are hereby incorporated into the Description of the Embodiments,with each claim standing on its own as a separate exemplary embodiment.

1. A microprocessor-implemented method comprising: dynamicallyproducing, by a microprocessor, a rasterizer, the rasterizer reflectsprocessing to move an existing graphical state to a modified graphicalstate; and processing, by the microprocessor, the rasterizer to producethe modified graphical state on a display.
 2. The method of claim 1further comprising, defining, by the microprocessor, the rasterizer byimage attributes for the modified graphical state.
 3. The method ofclaim 3 further comprising, indexing, by the microprocessor, therasterizer in memory for subsequent use by the microprocessor, therasterizer indexed based on the image attributes for the modifiedgraphical state.
 4. The method of claim 1, wherein dynamically producingfurther includes tokenizing the rasterizer, each token representing aportion of processing for moving the existing graphical state to themodified graphical state.
 5. The method of claim 4, wherein tokenizingfurther includes inserting tokens for depth perception, modulation,texture, and blending.
 6. The method of claim 1, wherein processingfurther includes matching tokens in the rasterizer to generic functionsacquired from memory, each function processed in a specific order asdefined by the tokens.
 7. The method of claim 1, wherein processingfurther includes accessing memory pointed to by specific functionsidentified in the rasterizer to process the rasterizer.
 8. A machineaccessible medium having associated instructions, which when processed,result in a machine performing: assembling, by the machine, pointerreferences to functions available in memory of the machine, the pointerreferences defining a rasterizer; and executing, by the machine, therasterizer to process the functions to move a current graphical state ofthe machine to a modified graphical state for the machine.
 9. The mediumof claim 8, wherein assembling further includes acquiring existing imageattributes for the current graphical state and identifying the functionsthat move the existing image attributes for the current graphical stateto modified image attributes that define the modified graphical state.10. The medium of claim 9, wherein acquiring further includes indexingin the memory with the modified image attributes to identify thefunctions for moving to the modified graphical state.
 11. The medium ofclaim 8, wherein assembling further includes tokenizing the rasterizerwith tokens that identify the functions, each token representing one ofthe pointer references.
 12. The medium of claim 8, wherein tokenizingfurther includes ordering the tokens within the rasterizer to ensure thefunctions are processed in a predefined order.
 13. The medium of claim8, wherein processing further includes passing parameters to thefunctions via registers of the machine, each parameter directed to aspecific architecture of the machine that produces a specific output forthat architecture.
 14. An microprocessor-implemented apparatus,comprising: a microprocessor; and memory; the microprocessor configuredto dynamically produce and to execute a rasterizer by acquiringfunctions that are processed from the memory to move a current graphicalstate to a modified graphical state.
 15. The apparatus of claim 14further comprising, an electronic display that the modified graphicalstate is rendered to.
 16. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein theapparatus is embedded in a phone.
 17. The apparatus of claim 14, whereinmemory includes a plurality of available functions from which thefunctions are selectively acquired by the microprocessor.
 18. Theapparatus of claim 14, wherein the microprocessor is configured to passparameters to the functions based on an architecture of themicroprocessor.
 19. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein themicroprocessor is configured to initially define the current graphicalstate by defining current image attributes for the current graphicalstate.
 20. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the microprocessor isconfigured to index the functions within the memory based on imageattributes defined for each of the functions.